1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an electric charge concentration (ECC) type droplet dispensing device having a nonconductive capillary nozzle.
2. Description of the Related Art
A droplet dispensing device is a device that discharges very small droplets of a solution on a substrate, a film, a recoding medium, or the like. There are various methods of discharging droplets. For example, an inkjet method is used in an inkjet printer. However, in the inkjet method, a solution (e.g., ink) is heated, and thus, the method is not suitable for discharging a thermally sensitive solution. Specifically, when droplets of a solution containing biomolecules such as nucleic acids, proteins, biocells, viruses, bacteria, and the like, are discharged in the fabrication of biochips, a droplet dispensing device capable of discharging the droplets without heating the solution is advantageous.
A device for discharging droplets of a picoliter size using ultrasonic energy has been developed by Labcyte Inc. However, there remains a need for a droplet dispensing device that has better durability and high operation speed, and can discharge droplets of uniform size, and be miniaturized.